When Chicago’s Vienna Sausage Company moved from its original premises which were “put together in a Rube Goldberg kind of arrangement” to a brand new state-of-the-art facility, the sausages didn’t taste as good. For a year and a half, the company tried to work out the problem to no avail. One day, workers were remixadniscing about an ex-employee, Irving, who didn’t come to work at the new factory due to the long commute required. Irving’s job was to move the sausages from the filling room to the smokehouse, taking them on a half hour journey through a maze of rooms where other products were getting produced. After noting this absence, it clicked that Irving’s daily trip was the secret ingredient\u200a—\u200aon his journey the sausages were getting pre-cooked and infused with flavor. The company was evenxadtuxadally able to recreate the sausages’ original taste, building a brand new room onto the factory which emulated the propxaderxadties of Irving’sxa0trip.

— Anna Pendergrast & Kelly Pendergrast, Notes, 2023-07-10, Scope of Work, 2023 (via)